Embodiments of the invention relate to the analysis of process parameter variations of processes and in particular to an apparatus and a method for processing a process simulation database of a process.
The robustness of production processes and the quality of the resulting products can suffer significantly under variations of material, process or geometry parameters as well as external influences. Analyzing the effects of these variations and possibly minimizing the same is a challenging task and an objective in product development. This is in particular the case when entire chains of (production) processes are considered. Incorporating the history of the process into the analysis of the normally exclusively considered last step of the chain can result in significant improvements of the prediction quality. For example in the process chain forming-crash (forming-accident) in the automotive industry, for devices having a potentially critical influence in the crash (accident), such as B pillars consisting of several molded and joined parts, statistical analysis and complete transfer of all local variations across all process steps results in valuable insights and results for product development.
For following variations of process parameters with the help of process simulation data across several process steps, the output data of the process simulation of a process have to be adapted to the prerequisites for input data of the follow-up process. Also, the amount of data has to be kept within a manageable limit. Still, the behavior of the process under the variation of the process parameters is to be mapped as accurately as possible.